SEIR
by Iris Butterfly
Summary: That incident by the lake changed everything - Severus Snape does not exist anymore.


**Note**: Standard disclaimer applies, and apologies if any characters are not in-character at all. This is from a prompt I've posted on reddit of, what if Snape was a demon?

* * *

Severus Snape openly scowled and glared at the group of people before him. The Marauders had ganged up on him while he was busy perusing the questions he remembered from his OWL exams. He supposed it should not surprise him that they would gang up on him in broad daylight in front of other students, or the fact that other students would be disinclined to help him.

It irked him that his own spell – Levicorpus, one that he created and privately shared with his childhood friend, Lily Evans, mere days ago – had been used against him.

His scowl only deepened when he silently scanned the crowd to locate Lily and saw a flash of amused smile on her expression. It seemed she quickly schooled her face when she saw him looking at her and came forward to say:

"Leave him alone!"

He could not believe that his supposedly childhood best friend was amused by his humiliation. It seemed the fact that she was a prefect more responsible than Lupin did not matter, because clearly – _clearly_ – she was just the same as everyone else he had met.

At this point, Severus did not care about this whole matter anymore. Everyone – the whole Hogwarts institution and all persons he met through this life – was not worth his time and effort anymore. He originally started this whole operation because it might amuse and alleviate his boredom; however, it was not worth the endeavor considering the events he had to go through due to bigotry amongst other things.

In the beginning, it greatly amused him to take time to choose certain characteristics and personality for his guise. He decided to choose to be from an impoverish family, simply because he had lived his whole existence as a royalty, and it would have been a challenge to be someone from an opposite spectrum. Furthermore, it gave him a great ordeal to ensure that he behaved in the manner of his chosen character, but it soon transformed into a wormhole of boredom when each day fell into the same monotonous routine, simply to maintain that disguise.

It also didn't help that his father from this lifetime, Tobias, was an alcoholic and abusive man, who liked to drink away any and all savings they had. Nor did it help that his mother, Eileen, was a meek woman who would not stand up to her alcoholic and abusive husband in favor of her son.

Nonetheless, he digressed.

His eyes narrowed at the Marauders' antics and at every student in the premise who thought this was 'funny'. He wordlessly channeled his powers to counter the levitation spell, and nimbly landed on his feet, uncaring of the fact that he surprised everyone with his nimbleness.

"Enough is enough. You are all pathetic." Severus remarked scathingly with his eyes ablaze with hidden anger. "Especially the prefects in the crowd who preferred to watch the scene unfold instead of helping like you were supposed to. As of this moment, you are all dead to me."

He did not bother to wait for their response and stalked off amid stunned silence from the populace. He would have stayed to throw an insult or five, but he feared he would have cursed them and that would result in unneeded paperwork. In addition, he could have used his demonic abilities to disappear from the premise for theatrics, but he did not have permission from his King to use his powers on this mortal plane nor did he want to showcase his abilities this soon.

* * *

Lily pursed her lips into a frown as she looked over to the Slytherin table – once again, she did not see Severus at the table. Two weeks had passed since the incident by the lake, and it had been just as long since she had seen or heard her best friend.

She wished she understood why Severus had uttered those rude words to her and everyone else. In fact, she could not fathom why he did not understand that everyone was simply having fun after the exams – sure, Potter and his friends had gone a little far with their pranks, but no one had gotten hurt and she tried to stop them as soon as it happened.

"_As of this moment, you are all dead to me."_

Those words echoed in her mind once more as she looked at the Slytherin table with a frown. No one in that House was forthcoming about Severus's whereabouts, even when the professors asked them – it was as if her best friend disappeared altogether, but that seemed and sounded impossible.

After all, no one could leave Hogwarts without the professors or the Headmaster's knowledge.

"Hey, Lily! No need to lecture Snivellus about the Dark Arts anymore!" Peter Pettigrew crowed amid loud guffaws from other Marauders. "Then again, I can't believe he has the guts to be absent from classes for two weeks!"

As much as Lily did not want to admit it, this whole incident made her uneasy – she kept remembering that scene and had felt unparalleled oppressive powers rolling in waves from Severus. It was almost as if she was about to face judgment before an unknown deity. However, that rush of power disappeared so quickly that she had to ponder if she had imagined the whole thing altogether. It was surreal to say the least.

"It's too bad he's a coward if he's hiding somewhere and licking his wounds. I would've liked to remind him just whom he backtalked to, you know." James Potter scowled while glancing at the Slytherin table.

All in all, what had occurred by the lake made her feel uneasy and left a sour taste in her mouth. She had no desire to celebrate over the humiliation of her best friend (she inwardly questioned if they were still best friend) as some of her house mates were still keen to do.

The only small mercy was that Severus did not use Dark Arts to retaliate against the Marauders.

* * *

"Your Majesty, are you positive? We've just finished containing lower ranks in the East this morning."

He raised an eyebrow at the inquiry, and retorted with a cool, "Are you questioning me?"

"Of course not, sire." The hasty reply almost made his lips quirk in an amused smirk, and the being before him gave him an unimpressed and indignant look in response. "Please stop teasing me, my lord."

"Only if you'll stop with those titles." He answered with a huff and an exaggerated eye roll. "We've been in same army for centuries, and you've more than earned the right to call me by my name."

"What can I say? Your reactions to it is amusing. That's the only reason why I kept doing it." The being merely laughed at his scowling expression, and finally continued after the laughter settled down. "I don't understand why you wish to return to your disguise as Severus Snape, Seir. Please don't tell me you have machoism in your blood."

He scoffed at the latter remark and gave a dramatic eye roll at the mere notion of him having any sort of machoism. He supposed one would think so, simply because he chose his guise to be 'born' in an abusive and impoverish family. On top of that, he chose to bore the blunt of Marauders' bullying ways and everyone else's judgmental stares for his lacking financial support. Perhaps, he does have some semblance of machoistic tendencies… not that he would admit it to anyone.

"I've decided to shed my guise, Raim."

Raim simply raised a quizzical brow at the declaration and uttered, "Well, woe to humans who've crossed you. You, Seir, happened to be one of the most beautiful beings in our world. Don't tell me, you're announcing yourself on your winged steed. Humans might mistake you as an angel in a shiny armor, not that you wear an armor, of course."

"I'm not foolish, you dunderhead." An irritated look flashed in his eyes at the thought of going back to Hogwarts in his winged horse appeared in his eyes. "I'm merely going to shed the ugly characterization that made Severus Snape. I can't understand why humans are so petty and judgmental with their physical appearances."

A stifled laugh echoed in the silence that blanketed the two, and Raim choked out, "I knew it! You wouldn't last a lifetime in that guise. Phoenix owes me a legion of his troops for our next battle. In any case, were you still interested in joining the Death Eaters to see what the fuss is about? I believe you mentioned that you originally planned to do so, simply to ease your curiosity with darker nature of humankinds."

Seir shot an annoyed look at his still laughing friend and heaved a sigh at the lost cause. Silently, he mulled over the question – he originally wanted to investigate the fuss behind this new threat that would terrorize humankinds and to know about the innerworkings of such organization. Granted, it would give him and others a lot of work to sort out the souls and hand out punishments for the crimes those humans did (not to mention, mountainous paperwork that would surely follow thereafter).

"You know that we can't end a human life before their time." He reminded calmly while he ran a hand through his long ebony hair. "They would've made me kill someone in order to join their cause. Our King would be most displeased if that should happen."

"I still don't understand your fascination with humans. But, whatever floats your fancy, I suppose." Raim gave a careless shrug to dismiss the topic. "Phoenix is still on messenger duty for the next century because he lost a bet against Caim, so he's your go-to guy if you need something."

"For amount of times he's lost, Phoenix should know to stop betting against us."

"What can I say? I think he's into machoism."

Seir decided not to say anything to that regard since it was none of his business.

* * *

Seir, as much as he disliked admitting it, knew that he happened to be one of the most beautiful demons amongst others. He, like a handful of other demons, could be mistaken for an angel because of his looks – long ebony hair, ruby red eyes, and tall physique. He rarely journeyed to mortal plane in his true form for leisure, mostly because he liked his solidary and loathed to lure mortals' attractions onto him even without using his powers.

'This is an exception.' He concluded as he ran a hand over his disguise, instantly correcting the large hooked nose, crooked teeth, bad skincare, and limp greasy hair with his demonic powers.

He smirked at the image he saw in the mirror, knowing that his appearance now would be what Severus Snape would have looked like if he had some financial means to support himself. He supposed he could say this appearance was the handsome version of his disguise. He fixed the crooked green and silver tie, and then ran a hand through his hair. He didn't want to reveal himself too soon and gave away the fun.

"Let's get this game started." He murmured to his reflection, and promptly exited the dormitory.

Judging from the clock, it seemed he still had about an hour of breakfast before classes commenced for the day. A playful smirk materialized from the corner of his lips as he slowly headed towards Great Hall – his footsteps that ominously echoed against the floor would have instilled fear to anyone in the premise, that was, if there was someone in the vicinity.

Severus – he had to remind himself one last time that he was in his mortal guise – schooled his expression into an indifferent one before he flicked his wrist to wordlessly and wandlessly open the door.

It was almost laughable how every conversation stopped and how everyone's attention fixated on his person. He dismissed the attention, and instead made his way to the Slytherin table to sit in his usual spot. The irritated glare he fixated at everyone instantly made them divert their attention away from him, albeit unsuccessfully since he could feel curious gazes refocusing onto him.

"Where have you been, Snape? We haven't seen you in two weeks. It's like, you disappeared." Evan Rosier asked the important question. "And you look different too."

"Somewhere." He answered with a smirk that would surely aggravate lesser men.

Evan simply hummed in understanding and gave a slight shrug in response, and then dropped the topic altogether. If there was something good about the Slytherin House, it was this – no one pried anything from anyone if he or she did not want to talk about it. He highly doubted this was the case with other houses, especially Gryffindor.

Severus refocused his attention on his meal – not that he needed to eat – and hinted via his body language that he was not in the mood to converse. From the corner of his eyes, he noted that Lily was staring at him with a confused expression on her face.

He did not have to explain anything to her, no matter how much she thought he needed to because of their friendship. Moreover, that friendship died the moment she laughed during that incident by the lake.

* * *

Lily pursed her lips in a frown as she looked at Severus from across the room. They were currently in one of the greenhouses for Herbology class, and it irked her that her best friend was ignoring her for the past few days ever since his reappearance at the Great Hall.

"I don't understand why he's ignoring me, Mary." She confided to one of her girlfriends with a frown still on her lips.

"You haven't tried to talk to him, Lily. All you've done was look at him from across the room and hoped that he came to talk to you." Mary pointed out in an unapologetic blunt tone. "I mean, I know he turned into an eye candy after his transformation, but he won't know that you wanted to speak to him if you keep staring at him."

"And his transformation… how did he managed to change that drastically within a couple of weeks?" Lily continued with an uneasy look. "Do you think he used Dark Arts for it?"

"It's hypocritical of you to assume that, don't you think so, Lily?" Marlene rebutted in a sharp tone. "You're the one who keeps telling us that he is your best friend, but you're also the one who keeps undermining everything he does. I'm not defending Snape, but I think it's unfair that his best friend doesn't believe he could be good."

Lily opened and closed her mouth repeatedly, and then looked across the room to see that Severus gave her a cold look that sent shivers down her spine. It was as if he heard her conversation, but that couldn't be… right?

She shook away her thoughts and refocused her attention on the lesson. She would have to talk with her best friend after class – Marlene was right, it wouldn't do her any good to presume anything. Thus, she gave an inward determined nod at her decision and continued the class with renewed burst of energy.

"Sev! Wait! I'd like to talk to you!"

Lily immediately ran after Severus as soon as class finished, uncaring about the fact that nearly everyone in class was staring at her. She ignored unsavory comments from the Marauders and some students from Slytherin. Instead, she watched as Severus paused in mid-stride, but did not bother to turn around to face her.

She does not understand why Severus was behaving this way. Was it something she did?

"There is nothing to talk about, Miss Evans." He responded in a cool tone, and added, "If you'll excuse me," in a dismissive manner when she was about to protest that notion.

What had she done to receive such cold treatment from him?

"What, just because you look somewhat good now, you think you're too good for her?" James interrupted scathingly with a glower.

Severus flicked a glance with an impassive expression, a look that clearly indicated that James was beneath his notice, and wordlessly resumed walking away from the scene.

"How dare you ignored us!" James shouted angrily and whipped out his wand to say, "Stupefy!"

"James!" Lily immediately interjected as she fumbled to take out her own wand to negate the attack; however, she was too late since the bolt of red light was nearing Severus, who simply raised a brow at the ambush.

She wasn't positive if Severus had casted a shield charm wordlessly and wandlessly, but the stunning charm bounced off from an invisible barrier of some sort.

Stunned silence blanketed the area with some students looking at the Gryffindor for attacking another student (even if it was a Slytherin student) when their back was turned, while others looked at the Slytherin for being able to block the ambush without a wand or word.

"How brave of you to attack someone when their back was turned." Severus remarked sarcastically with a sneer. He was about to say more on the matter, but instantly stopped when a note materialized before him in a burst of fire. He flicked a glance at the note and uttered, "Understood," without elaborating on the subject.

The note itself burst into a tower of fire without any warning, but the calm demeanor from her best friend hinted that he knew this would happen. Furthermore, the dismissal look he issued towards everyone in the premise made her believe that they were unimportant to whatever was on that note.

"Don't you dare walk away from us, you slimy snake!" Sirius barked heatedly with his wand aimed towards Severus's retreating figure.

The low tone in which her best friend uttered, "Phoenix," resonated through the silent hallway and whatever he said thereafter was in an unfamiliar language that she had no way to decipher.

Since when did Severus speak another language, and how come she was unaware of this fact? It baffled her that he was becoming an unreachable and mysterious person ever since that incident by the Great Lake, and she hardly knew her best friend anymore.

* * *

Lily looked over to the Slytherin table once more during dinner, frowning at the fact that her attempts to converse with him had been disastrous – that was to say, it had been one cold treatment after another.

Her brows furrowed when the double doors to the Great Hall magically closed. Judging from the baffled expressions from the professors and headmaster, it looked as if they, too, were unaware of why this was happening.

The artificial sky on the ceiling disappeared in a burst of shimmering lights and revealed the night sky with what it seemed to be several bursts of unexplainable lights.

"Headmaster, what's going on?" Professor McGonagall inquired with pursed lips.

"I believe we are under lockdown until whatever this has passed."

Uneasy murmurs resonated throughout the Great Hall, each person attempting to decipher what those bursts of light meant and who or what was trying to attack Hogwarts. There were also a handful of conversations from the Ravenclaw table trying to decipher how Hogwarts knew about this attack.

"Seir, it seems the D and E ranks are seconds away from entering this sphere. You have the King's permission to dispose of them as you please. Your legions are on standby, should you need them." A childlike voice cut through several conversations, arousing confusion amongst both professors and students alike.

Who in the world is Seir? As far as Lily knew, there was no student by that name.

"Who the hell is Seir?" Sirius voiced the same thought she just had while he looked around the Great Hall to identify that person.

"Tell them they're not needed. I'll take on this nuisance by myself – it shouldn't take more than a couple of minutes." Severus replied to the mysterious voice as he stood up from the Slytherin table.

"Your confidence is astounding, my lord." The childlike voice giggled in a teasing tone. "Oh, and His Highness asked that you find the human who summoned these idiots to this plane. He wishes to have a conversation…"

The ominous tone that trailed the last phrase sent shivers down Lily's spine, and the wicked smirk that etched on Severus's face did not help ease that fear either.

"Mr. Snape, what is going on?" Professor McGonagall interrupted sharply with a severe look. "Who was that person? And where is he?"

Severus simply answered with a smirk and shed his robe, revealing a dark colored silk shirt and a pair of equally dark colored pants. The foreboding footsteps from his shoes somehow echoed throughout the Great Hall despite confused murmurs from other students. A golden light sigil depicting a pair of wings materialized underneath his feet and slowly rose over his person. When it finally passed over his head, there stood a handsome man with long black hair tied in half ponytail and ruby red eyes.

"Who are you, and what have you done to Severus Snape?" Professor Slughorn demanded.

A knowing smirk etched on the man's expression, as if something amused him, but answered nonetheless, "I am he, and he is I. Everything about him was my creation, solely made due to my boredom and desire to traverse through mortal plane. I am known as Seir."

Severus – or rather, Seir – did not bother to elaborate about his background and glanced up at the ceiling with a look of concentration. The burst of lights, which Lily understood as portals, froze in midair for a couple of seconds before they burst in showers of sparkles simultaneously. It was astounding to see that he, somehow, managed to penetrate through Hogwarts' defense mechanism to somehow destroy those portals.

"Paperwork is going to be fun." Seir remarked sarcastically with an exaggerated eyeroll; however, he did not bother to explain what just transpired. "With that being said, Headmaster Dumbledore, Severus Snape will be resigning from Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry effective immediately."

"Can I ask why?" The Headmaster implored in a grandfatherly tone.

"This has turned into ennui and mundane, to put it rather simply." The blunt tone Seir used was sharp and unyielding, almost as if it was judging each person's worthiness. "I merely created the persona 'Severus Snape' because I was bored. I am neither good nor evil, and personally, I find your bigotry against the Slytherin House disgusting. It is rather astonishing how you cast the entire House as evil because of one wizard's deed. Light does not mean good and just, and Dark does mean bad and evil. Nonetheless, I do not have any desire to participate in combat against your Dark Lord – it is not my fight, and there is no merit for me to participate."

"Who are you, really?" Lily gulped nervously when his gaze met hers as soon as she uttered those words out loud.

"Seir, Prince of the East Abyss. In other words, I am, what you call, a demon." He answered with a predatory grin and gave a mocking bow towards the Headmaster. "I shall see you all when you arrive at the Gate for Judgment. Until then."

Those words somehow echoed through the Great Hall, and he disappeared from everyone's sight in a dramatic show of lights and feathers. The only indication that he was ever present was the mysterious sigil depicting a pair of wings in a circle with the letters 'S.E.I.R' encompassing it.


End file.
